sterbo

This is so incredibly disturbing that it leaves me virtually speechless...


(02-12) 04:00 PST WILKES-BARRE , Pa. -- For years, the juvenile court system in Wilkes-Barre operated like a conveyor belt: Youngsters were brought before judges without a lawyer, given hearings that lasted only a minute or two, and then sent off to juvenile prison for months for minor offenses.
The explanation, prosecutors say, was corruption on the bench.

In one of the most shocking cases of courtroom graft on record, two Pennsylvania judges have been charged with taking millions of dollars in kickbacks to send teenagers to two privately run youth detention centers.

"I've never encountered, and I don't think that we will in our lifetimes, a case where literally thousands of kids' lives were just tossed aside in order for a couple of judges to make some money," said Marsha Levick, an attorney with the Philadelphia-based Juvenile Law Center, which is representing hundreds of youths sentenced in Wilkes-Barre.

Prosecutors say Luzerne County Judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan took $2.6 million in payoffs to put juvenile offenders in lockups run by PA Child Care LLC and a sister company, Western PA Child Care LLC. The judges were charged on Jan. 26 and removed from the bench by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court shortly afterward.

No company officials have been charged, but the investigation is continuing.

The high court, meanwhile, is looking into whether hundreds or even thousands of sentences should be overturned and the juveniles' records expunged.

Among the offenders were teenagers who were locked up for months for stealing loose change from cars, writing a prank note and possessing drug paraphernalia. Many had never been in trouble before. Some were imprisoned even after probation officers recommended against it.

Many appeared without lawyers, despite the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark 1967 ruling that children have a constitutional right to counsel.

The judges are scheduled to plead guilty to fraud today in federal court. Their plea agreements call for sentences of more than seven years behind bars.

Ciavarella, 58, who presided over Luzerne County's juvenile court for 12 years, acknowledged last week in a letter to his former colleagues, "I have disgraced my judgeship. My actions have destroyed everything I worked to accomplish and I have only myself to blame." Ciavarella, though, has denied he got kickbacks for sending youths to prison.

Conahan, 56, has remained silent about the case.

Many Pennsylvania counties contract with privately run juvenile detention centers, paying them either a fixed overall fee or a certain amount per youth, per day.

In Luzerne County, prosecutors say, Conahan shut down the county-run juvenile prison in 2002 and helped the two companies secure contracts worth tens of millions of dollars, at least some of that dependent on how many juveniles were locked up.

One of the contracts - a 20-year agreement with PA Child Care worth an estimated $58 million - was later canceled by the county as exorbitant.

The judges are accused of taking payoffs between 2003 and 2006.

*AP

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Herbania

I think this story explains why private prisons are a bad idea.

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Fighting fire with empty words While the banks get fat
And the poor stay poor And the rich get rich
And the cops get paid To look away
As the one percent rules America
-Queensryche

joshpackr

This does not surprise me in the least. The whole criminal justice system is pretty corrupt, this is but one example.

I hope those judges get to meet Big Bubba real soon.

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Yana Usdi

Seven years isn't nearly enough for what they did, it should be more like seven per count. To be served consecutively.

Being locked up at any point can have a bad effect on a person but more so to a juvenile still in their formative years than to an adult, and to do that to someone for a profit? They should spend the rest of their lives behind bars for what they did to so many kids.

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"Give a man a fish, and he will eat for a day. Teach him to fish, and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day." -Dan Moon

Always be kind to animals, Morning, noon and night: For animals have feelings too, And furthermore, they bite. - John Gardner

Pompo

I'm thinking they should be locked up for an amount of time that is equivilent to the combined amount of time all those kids had to spend in prison

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Freedom_User

Oh I am so pissed.

7 Effin years? And how many years have they ruined kids lives? I wan't to see these people in one of the harshest prisons in the States.

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The feds continually use and twist this simple clause as an excuse to expand their own power - at the expense of our liberty.

"If you shot a ton of pot to the Sun, will it burn up and get everyone high?"

wake and bacon

I'm definitely in agreement that 7 years is way too short for the crime they have committed... they literally ruined tons of kids lives due to this... fucked up.

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toothfairy420

Heh...just wait till Bubba finds out who these guys are, and why they are in there...

Juvenile hall is nothing but criminal 101, these judges have no idea the negative impact they have had, not only on these kids, but in society as a whole.

meet the decline

i live in this SHITTY area. i personally know a prison guard who went to high school with Ciavarella. he said the guy was always a fucking asshole to him and basically every one else. Ciavarella is being sent to the prison he works at.... he said a lot of people are looking forward to it and that he's going to return the favor of making his life a living hell for a while.

he really fucked up a lot of peoples lives. around here if you were facing Ciavarella, you knew you were fucked

LowRider

Democracy Now! | Penn. Judges Get Kickbacks for Placing Youths in Privately Owned Jails

judges accepting kickbacks and sending youths to a private facility, this has to make you wounder how much of this is happening. as we all know if there's one bad apple there's bound to be more lurking else where.